From the subscriber's perspective, calls which are intended for a prior subscriber are often annoying and sometimes harassing. Recent acceleration of the rate of change of assigned telephone numbers (increased `churn`) has increased significantly the problem of calls going to the wrong party; the shortened length of time a number can be held out of service means that within a few months a reassigned number will receive calls from callers still attempting to reach the previous subscriber. This problem is not addressed by number intercept, since the called number has a new valid subscriber.
A consequence is that a single number carries its history with it. Callers who use their own databases of telephone numbers, which are not maintained synchronously with the telephone system, dial the reassigned number and contact the later subscribers instead of persons they had intended to reach. When such calls concern debts owed by the prior subscriber, or other such adverse needs motivating the call, the subscriber receiving the call unjustly bears the adverse burden. The telephone company (telco) currently has no way to relieve the burden apart from reassigning the innocent subscriber's phone number once again. The causative problem, that is, the inaccurate number used by the caller, remains uncorrected. Further, the reassignment of the subscriber's number carries no guarantee that the newly-assigned number will be free of adverse history.
The invention resolves the subscriber's problem, and motivates callers to obtain and maintain accurate data concerning those they wish to contact. It further lessens the burden of complaints that are handled by the telco.
From the caller's perspective, failing to connect to the desired party is a single problem. The caller wants to make the connection regardless of whether the failure was due to a recent change of service for the desired party, to a not-recent change of service (in which case the number used has been reassigned to a new subscriber), to an incorrectly-stored or incorrectly-entered number. The invention provides the caller with a clear distinction among these three cases, and optionally offers the caller a directory-assistance search in the process, all of which simplifies the caller's task.
Even when intercepted, the called party's new number is not always provided or available. This necessitates a separate call to directory assistance on the caller's part. The invention obviates the need for a separate call to directory assistance in this case.